At First Light

by Mari Madison

  I realized my car hood was steaming. Shit. I opened the door, practically falling out of the seat. Walking around to the front I inspected the grill. Great. I groaned. There was no way I was driving away from this. And so I rummaged in my pocket for my phone, finding the number of a tow truck company and placing the call. They told me to hang tight—they’d be there within a half hour.

  I settled down on the side of the road to wait. I thought about calling Sarah, asking her to come pick me up, but I was too ashamed of my earlier behavior. What would she say if she saw me now? Sitting here, as broken as my new car. The thought made the anger roll through me once again like a heavy fog on approach and I fought to stanch the emotions raging through me. Push down the anger, the frustration, the fear.

  My mind spun along with my vision and for a moment I indulged in the fantasy that she was approaching. My dream Sarah, the one who had visited me so often when I was down in that dark hole. Putting her arms around me, holding me close, whispering sweet nothings in my ear. Soothing my fears.

  But no. I shook my head, forcing the vision to vacate my brain. After all, how could I allow dream Sarah to comfort me, when I’d pushed the real Sarah away? She’d been trying to comfort me, too. Give me tough love. And I had yelled at her. Run away like a scolded child. I didn’t deserve her comfort—dream or otherwise.

  Finally, the tow truck came. They put my car on the back of the truck and then offered to give me a ride back to my house, since it was on the way. I took it: What else could I do? Soon we were heading back to my place. As the driver chatted amicably, I found myself wondering if Sarah would still be there. Waiting for me to return. I knew I didn’t deserve her to be. If she were smart, she would have taken off right away. But something deep inside of me prayed she would be there anyway. So I could apologize to her. Promise to do better.

  To man up, once and for all.

  When we pulled into the apartment complex, I was surprised to see red-and-blue lights flashing outside. Police lights. My heart leapt to my throat and a chill shivered down my back. I tried to tell myself that they were probably there for another apartment—there were dozens in my building, after all. No reason to suspect this had anything to do with me.

  But when I got out of the tow truck, my eyes fell upon the line of reporters, just beyond the police tape. A sinking feeling dropped to my stomach.

  “Troy! Troy Young!” they called. “What happened? Why are the police here? Is it true, the mayor’s daughter is inside?”

  I ignored them, picking up the pace until I reached my front door. A policeman stopped me before I could go in.

  “This is an official investigation,” he stated. “You’ll have to get back behind the yellow line.”

  “I live here,” I protested, my heart pounding in my chest now. Oh God. What had happened? Why were they here? Was Sarah okay? I craned my neck to try to see beyond the officer. “I’m Troy Young,” I tried again. “This is my place.”

  The man squinted at me. “Oh. Right. Of course. Sorry. Come in.”

  I barely gave him enough time to step aside, pushing past him to burst into my apartment, my throat dry and my stomach churning. My eyes darted around the living room until they located Sarah, sitting on the couch, looking unharmed. Relief flooded through me so hard and fast I almost gagged on it.

  “Sarah!” I cried, running to her. I dropped to my knees in front of her, looking her over, trying to figure out what the hell could have happened. “Are you okay? Why are the police here? Did something happen?”

  Oh God. I had left her all alone. I had left her alone, knowing she’d been threatened. If anything had happened to her. If anyone had hurt her . . .

  “I’m . . . fine,” she said, but her shaky voice betrayed her words. “I heard a knock at the door and I went to see who it was. I thought it was you at first—like, maybe you’d left in a hurry and forgotten your keys. But then I looked through the peephole.”

  My heart thudded uneasily in my chest as I caught the flash of terror across her face. “And . . . ?” I asked, not sure I really wanted to know.

  “It was Ryan.”

  “Wait, what?” I stared at her, horrified. “Ryan? Ryan Robinson? But he’s—”

  “—Out of prison,” she finished for me in a dull voice. “My father just called and told me. Out early for good behavior.”

  “And he came here? To my apartment?”

  She nodded. Her face was pale. Her expression grave. “I don’t know if he somehow found out I was going to be here—or if he was just looking for you. I ran to the phone and called the police. He knocked three times, but then finally took off. They’ve been looking around the area—to make sure he isn’t hiding out anywhere. But they think he left.” She shrugged helplessly.

  I closed my eyes for a moment, trying to quell the panic rising inside of me. I couldn’t fall apart now. Not when Sarah needed me to stay strong. I forced myself to take a deep breath. To try to calm my nerves. My eyes darted to the peanut butter jar still on the coffee table. I tried to remember the ingredients, one by one.

  Rising to my feet, I paced the room, my steps eating up the distance between the walls. Oh God. This was the last thing we needed now. Ryan out of prison. Ryan ready to seek revenge. Ryan showing up at my front door.

  My fault. My fault. My fault.

  I turned back to her. “I’m so sorry,” I said, then cringed at how lame the words sounded coming from my mouth.

  She shook her head. “It’s fine. I mean—it’s not fine. But it is what it is. In any case, my father is on his way to get me. Or . . . one of his people is . . . I don’t know.” Her voice cracked a little on the last part and my heart panged in my chest. I knew how much she didn’t want to get her father involved in any of this.

  But she’d had no choice. Because I’d left her alone.

  I dropped to my knees in front of her, grabbing her hands in mine. They were cold—ice-cold—and stiff under my grip. “I’m going to fix this,” I promised. “Someway, somehow. I will make this go away.”

  But she only shook her head again. “No. You have enough going on as it is,” she told me. “Don’t worry about it.” But what I heard in her voice was more like don’t worry about me.

  I swallowed hard, feeling my heart shatter into a thousand pieces. I wanted to tell her I would always worry about her. That there was no possible way to get me to stop worrying about her. Because I cared about her. Hell, I probably still loved her. I probably never stopped loving her these past five years.

  But I knew all the sentiments in the world wouldn’t make a bit of difference in the end. After all, I couldn’t even fix myself.

  How could I possibly think I could fix things for her?

  twenty-eight

  SARAH

  I walked into my dad’s kitchen Saturday morning, raising my eyebrows as I found him and Mrs. Anderson having coffee while poring over the newspapers. I didn’t know why I was surprised; the two of them had been thick as thieves for years—she was always wining and dining him in an effort to keep him as News 9’s biggest advertiser. And he was never reluctant to eat up the attentions of a beautiful, powerful woman. Of course, up until recently she had been a beautiful, powerful, married woman and so any rumors of them being more than business partners were quickly put to rest.

  But last year her husband, legendary weatherman Stormy Anderson—Asher’s father—had brought her to divorce court around the same time my dad had announced he was running for mayor. And suddenly their meetings had become more frequent. Especially the “early morning” ones I wasn’t entirely convinced hadn’t started the night before.

  “There she is!” Mrs. Anderson exclaimed, setting down the paper. She raised her coffee (likely Irish) in my direction. “The woman of the hour.”

  “What?” I squinted at her, puzzled as I wandered over to the coffeemaker. “What are you talking about?�
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  I hadn’t slept much the night before and was still exhausted. I kept tossing and turning, thinking about Ryan showing up at the door, looking for some kind of revenge. What would he have done if I had opened the door without looking? Would he have gone through with his threats? Would I still be here this morning? Was he only trying to scare me? Or did he have something much worse in mind?

  It was strange. He had never been violent back in the day. In fact, if anything he always came off as a peace-loving hippie. Of course he never came off as a white-collar thief, either. So clearly he had been hiding some of his less desirable qualities back then. And then, of course, he had made those threats in the courtroom as they dragged him off to prison. Promising to make me pay . . .

  Evidently accounts had finally come due.

  I shuddered again as I remembered peeking through that peephole. Seeing his face. He looked older than I remembered him being. I guess that was inevitable: We all had aged, after all. A little paunchier around the waist. Lines around his eyes. But what had really struck me last night was how tired he looked. As if the magnetic spark that had always shone in his eyes—the spark that had made everyone want to do exactly what he suggested—had been extinguished. Guess prison could do that to a guy.

  Too bad it couldn’t also quench his thirst for revenge . . .

  And then there was Troy—poor, damaged Troy. The horror in his eyes when he’d walked through that front door after the police had arrived. I could tell he felt terribly guilty for walking out on me, for leaving me alone when the psycho showed up at his front door. Even though he could have had no way of knowing Ryan was lurking when he left.

  It had been so awkward—I wanted to say a million things to comfort him. To tell him I didn’t blame him for taking off like he did. But, of course, I couldn’t say much with the police standing around.

  But then he told me about his wrecked car. How he’d almost hit a tree. And suddenly all my sympathy went out the window and it was all I could do not to slap him upside the head. To scream at him for being so stupid. For taking off and driving when he was clearly not in control of his emotions. You’re sick! I wanted to scream. You need help! You cannot do this on your own!

  But I knew, in my heart, my words would only fall on deaf ears. With all that was happening, he had been way too upset to hear them. I’d have to try again later. When he was calm. When we were alone. Maybe, just maybe, I could convince him to seek help.

  I realized Mrs. Anderson was talking.

  “Why, my dear, haven’t you heard?” she was saying, her eyes sparkling beneath her heavy makeup. “The ratings for your first He Said, She Said segment are through the roof! In fact, the most searched term on our website this morning was ‘Are Troy Young and Sarah Martin a couple in real life?’”

  I stared at her, my eyes wide. “What? You’re kidding, right?”

  “I never kid about ratings, darling,” she huffed. Then she pushed the newspaper in my direction, opened to the Inside Track gossip page. I cringed as my eyes fell upon an article about “a certain mayor’s daughter” caught leaving the apartment of a certain “American hero” late last night.

  “A match made in TV news heaven!” exclaimed Mrs. Anderson, taking the paper back from me. “I couldn’t have planned it better myself!”

  I glanced nervously at my dad; what was his take on this? But he only shrugged. I sighed.

  “Look, I’m glad the segment got good ratings. But Troy and I are not a couple anymore. And we have no plans on becoming one, either. We’re just coworkers.”

  “Of course you are, sweetheart,” Mrs. Anderson agreed, practically winking at me as she said it. I rolled my eyes. Whatever.

  “In any case,” my father interjected, “let me know when you’re ready to go down to city hall this morning. We need to file that restraining order against Ryan. And I’ve scheduled a press conference for noon.”

  Wait, what? “A press conference? For what?”

  He turned to me, his eyes grave. “You are being stalked. By someone who should still be in prison. We need to let people know. They have to understand what these bleeding-heart liberals are doing to the safety of our citizens.”

  I cringed. “Are you even kidding me right now?” I demanded. “You’re going to politicize my stalking? To get your crime bill pushed through? That’s low, Dad. Even for you, that’s low.”

  “Come on, Sarah. This kind of thing is exactly why the bill needs to go through in the first place,” my father shot back. “Here we have a dangerous criminal. Out on the streets. Threatening my own daughter. We need to make people aware that this kind of thing can happen.”

  I frowned, my skin suddenly feeling itchy. I set my coffee down on the counter, no longer thirsty. “Look, I’ll get the restraining order,” I said. “But I draw the line at doing a press conference about this. My personal life is already out on display too much as it is,” I added, gesturing to the newspaper in Mrs. Anderson’s hands. “I don’t need to air any more dirty laundry than is already out to dry, thank you very much.”

  My dad looked disappointed, but to his credit didn’t argue any further. Instead, he turned back to his own newspaper, as if dismissing me outright. I frowned, watching him for a moment. I knew him too well to think he’d just give up on the idea altogether.

  I just hoped whatever it was he still had cooking, it wouldn’t have anything to do with me.

  twenty-nine

  TROY

  Are you okay, man? You look like hell.”

  My body stiffened as I walked into the entertainment office on Monday, only to be greeted by my favorite person in the world—the sniveling Ben. He gave me a derisive once-over, shaking his head.

  “I saw the news,” he continued. “Some stalker showed up to your house? Pretty lame, man. Especially since you’re ‘America’s hero’ and all.” He made air quotes with his hands, just to drive the point home.

  “Yeah,” I grunted, heading to my desk, trying to get away. I hadn’t slept most of the night before after Sarah left and the police finished their investigation. The apartment had felt too big, too empty. Every sound jerked me back awake. Not that I was afraid Ryan would return; I was pretty sure I could take him in a fight if I had to. No, I was more stressed about the handful of reporters still gathered outside my front door. Earlier, I had tried to step out of my apartment—to meet the guy delivering my rental car until mine could be fixed—and they’d pounced on me, driving me back into the house with questions about government policies when dealing with terrorists. About whether I should have been rescued or left in that hole. The car rental guy had been so freaked out, I was lucky he left the car.

  I didn’t blame Sarah for calling the police when Ryan showed up—I would have done the same. But the fallout for that call had come regardless. And now everyone knew where I lived. Any semblance of privacy I once had was gone for good.

  And so for the past two nights I tossed and turned and failed in chasing sleep. Last night I’d given up and started drinking around two AM, hoping to knock myself out. Instead, I only got drunk and paranoid and found myself securing every door with a chair and blocking every window. Just in case one of those bastards tried to sneak up and film me unaware.

  I finally passed out around four, only to be woken by one of my makeshift barriers crashing to the floor. Which sent my pulse skyrocketing, of course, and my heart to my throat. I grabbed a baseball bat and ran to the living room, ready to protect myself at any cost—before I realized it was just a toaster that I’d piled on top of a box, which was on top of a chair.

  Which was so stupid. And so pointless. As if any of this could keep me safe. As if anything could keep anyone safe anymore. In a rage, I tore it all down, managing to smash half of it in the process. Trashing my own house without apology. Hey, maybe some of those reporters were still out there, capturing this all on film. That should make a damn good t
op story. #AmericasHero #LosingItAtLast.

  I realized Ben had followed me to my desk. He was looking down at me with concern. “You don’t look so good,” he said, frowning. “Maybe you need to take a day off. Go home, relax. I got things covered here.”

  I glared at him, anger coursing inside of me again. “You would love that, wouldn’t you?” I growled. “Me going home so you could do my job yourself.”

  Ben raised his eyebrows, looking surprised. “No man,” he said, holding up his hands. “I just meant—”

  “You want to do my job? Fine. Do my damn job. I didn’t want it anymore anyway,” I added, rising to my feet, feeling the fury gushing through me now. “You do this ridiculous, pathetic, mindless job and I’ll go to Richard and get my real job back.”

  I shoved a stack of papers in his face. Printouts of possible story ideas I’d found the day before. Stupid, ridiculous, pandering story ideas that meant absolutely nothing, but which our viewers were sure to love.

  “Here,” I said. “They say Khloe Kardashian wore two pairs of Spanx to Fashion Week,” I told him. “Top story material if I ever heard it.”

  And with that, I turned on my heel and stormed out of the entertainment center. My skin was flushed with anger, and my steps burned up the distance across the newsroom floor. I could feel my coworkers staring at me from their little desk pods, but I ignored them all. They had been staring since day one. What the hell did I care about them? They were nothing. Nobody. Living their tiny lives. Working their stupid jobs. They’d never understand the hell it was to be me. No one could.

  I reached Richard’s office. His assistant stopped me at the door. “He’s on a call,” she said, stepping in my path. “You’ll have to—”